Re: NLM and Z39.50

(Kevin, I thought it useful for me to respond to everyone at once.)

All,

I'm not speaking officially for the NLM, but I believe the most
important reason that NLM's Z39.50 service to MEDLINE was turned off
was that it simply wasn't being used.  The usage logs showed this
very clearly.

I'm sure NLM would welcome expressions of new interest in a Z39.50
interface.  They may not be able simply to turn the old interface
back on, however, as it was based on (I know because I helped install
it) a legacy system interface that is no longer supported.

By the way, I'd guess there are a dozen implementors recieving this
message who could throw together a Z39.50 gateway to MEDLINE (PUBMED)
and to other crucial NLM databases in a week using NLM/NCBI's URL
conventions, documented at

    http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/utils/utils_index.html

Records come back with links to full text, to genome and molecular
databases, and more.  Hope this helps,

-John

-----------
From: kgamiel@islandedge.com, 21 Nov 2000 00:01:18 

As many of you know, the National Library of Medicine (NLM) recently
chose to disable their Z39.50 server interface to MEDLINE and replace it
with a non-standard system.  I am strongly disappointed that an
organization that seemed to take pride in engineering quality and
standards-based compliance would make such a decision.  Many of you may
not have known that NLM had a Z39.50 server to begin with, because they
did little if anything in terms of advertising or promoting that
standard access to what is arguably the most important database in the
world.  I am also discouraged that my plea to reinstate Z39.50 access
has been summarily dismissed by NLM.  I am upset by the actions of NLM
on a professional basis for reasons I don't need to explain to the ZIG,
but also for personal reasons.  I have worked for the past few months
with medical researchers from around the world to help research a
particular rare disease affecting a young member of my local community. 
I have written highly customized, free Z39.50-based software for these
researchers, only to find their access to Medline via Z39.50 sketchy or
nonexistent.  It is my belief that if NLM would reinstate Z39.50 access
and strongly promote the international standards-based interface, real
people with real diseases would benefit.

I urge everyone, particularly U.S. taxpayers, to send an email to the
director, Don Lindberg (lindberg@nlm.nih.gov), requesting that the
Z39.50 interface be reactivated.

Thanks,
Kevin

-- 
Kevin Gamiel                     Email: kgamiel@islandedge.com
Island Edge Research, Inc.       http://www.islandedge.com
Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina Phone: +1-252-449-8969

Received on Tuesday, 21 November 2000 13:24:04 UTC